Is the “seven-year itch” real?—a study on the changing divorce pattern in Chinese marriages

Drawing from the data collected in the 2010 China Family Panel Study (CFPS) baseline survey, this paper studies the changing divorce pattern in Chinese marriages as a whole and for four cohorts. We find an inverted U-shape pattern in the divorce risk for Chinese marriages with the peak coming earlier over time. Family life cycle theory, natural evolvement theory, and population heterogeneity theory provide three different perspectives on interpreting the “inverted-U” shape divorce pattern. Family life cycle theory and natural evolvement theory are not supported by the data; however, population heterogeneity theory fits the data quite well. Split-population model shows that divorce risk for divorced couples increase linearly with marriage duration. However, the curve must come down at the end since the majority of the population does not divorce. By comparing four cohorts divided by marriage year, we find that the proportion of divorced couples has increased over time and the slope of the risk function for divorced couples has increased rapidly.